Page 89 of PS: I Hate You

I always called Josh.

Or I figured things out on my own.

I guess that second one is my only option now.

Dom tilts his head side to side, letting out a delicious joint crack with each movement. “Mom and Dad are supportive of whatever, but they also have this expectation that we figure things out on our own. Especially with the twins being adults now.” He grimaces. “In theory, it might sound like a good parenting technique. Let your kids try, fail, learn, and make sure they take responsibility for their mistakes.”

“You don’t agree?”

Dom scratches the back of his neck. “To an extent. But I would’ve appreciated advice sometimes. From someone who’d lived life longer than me. From someone I trusted.”

“And that’s what you do for Adam and Carter?”

“When they let me.”

Not for the first time, I think back on their family dynamic. The Perry parents were always fun, and buoyant, and happy to cheer whoever on. They were kind and loving.

But Mr.Perry also spent a lot of hours working at the hospital and Emilia’s nonprofit demanded way more than a forty-hour workweek. Dom was the responsible one at home, taking on a parent-like role for his younger siblings.

“They look up to you,” I say.

Dom huffs a laugh. “Maybe. Doesn’t mean they listen to me.”

“Sure they do.” I keep going when Dom throws me a skeptical side-eye. “Okay, maybe not one hundred percent of the time. But they listen to you more than anyone else.”

“Not more than you.”

I open my mouth to argue, but all that comes out is “What?”

Dom keeps his eyes on the snowy road. “You’re the one they listen to. You’re the Perry twins whisperer.” His lips tick up in a smirk that immediately fades as his fingers tighten on the steering wheel. “With everything that happened, I never got a chance to thank you. For how you helped us out. That summer.”

That summer.

The one after my freshman year of college, when I saw Dom for the first time in months. He’d always had an air of responsibility, but the first few days of that summer, I was afraid he was going to combust from repressed anxiety.

His mother’s car accident almost destroyed him.

I’ve always thought of it as the summer Dom discarded me. But it’s also the summer when an illegal left turn plowed into the side of Mrs.Perry’s Prius and sent the woman to the hospital. The same one where her husband worked.

How must that have felt, for Nathanial to learn his wife was a few floors down in the ER, battered, bruised, and bleeding?

I never talked with Dom’s dad about it—we weren’t close like that—but I do know he took off work for maybe the first time in his whole life. Emilia was laid up in bed for weeks, needing help with everything, then she had to go to PT. Dom was supposed to start afull-time internship, but Josh told me Mr.Perry wanted him to turn it down and take care of his brothers and help with his mom when the surgeon had to return to work.

Yes, I helped, but it was selfish, really. I wanted to escape my grandmother and spend more time around the Perrys. I wanted to pretend their family was mine as much as I could.

“I spent the summer poolside.” I shrug. “Not a hardship.”

“Just you being around made everything easier.” He taps a random rhythm on the wheel with his thumbs. “Adam had a huge crush on you.”

I snort. “You were a fan of your teenage brother lusting after me? Didn’t seem so happy about it at the funeral.”

Dom stares straight ahead, but I spy the corner quiver that tells me he’s fighting against a smile.

“You know…” I adopt a contemplative tone. “Maybe I should be making these trips with Adam. Since I was so pivotal in his life.”

“Not happening,” Dom grumbles without an ounce of heat. He reaches over and claims my hand, his long fingers interlocking with mine.

For a moment, I sit motionless, trying to come to terms with the casually affectionate touch.